[14] Early viral hits included Canadian blogger Eva Bartlett defending the legitimacy of the 2014 Syrian presidential election, another attacking Syria's White Helmets civil defence volunteers, and one of Naouai describing messages from civilians in besieged Aleppo as "a coordinated PR campaign".

[13][15][16] According to the Atlantic Council's Digital Forensic Research Lab (DFRL), RT's parent company, ANO TV-Novosti, had registered In The Now's website.

In particular, the DFRL noted strong anti-Clinton bias in the 2016 U.S. presidential election coverage, including running several stories previously debunked by fact-checking website Snopes.

[6] Maffick ran three other Facebook pages: Soapbox, focusing on current affairs, Waste-Ed, on environmental issues, and Backthen, a history channel.

[6] In summer 2018, its video of Anna Dovgalyuk, a Russian social media star, campaigning against manspreading was watched by millions, but the European Union's EUvsDisinfo website alleged that it had been staged as a Kremlin propaganda operation, and it was removed by YouTube.

[9] EUvsDisinfo also accused the channel of promoting disinformation about the Douma chemical attack, including the screening of an interview with a child in Russian military custody.

For example, Soapbox's "About" section now read: "'Soapbox' is a political opinion brand of Maffick, which is owned and operated by Anissa Naouai and Ruptly GmbH, a subsidiary of RT".

[29] NBC describes Maffick as platforming sophisticated English-language video and text content for years that experts say is edited and curated in a way designed to exacerbate American political tensions.

[27]Franklin Foer in The Atlantic says that In the Now "build[s] audiences with ephemera (“Man Licks Store Shelves in Online Post”), then hit[s] unsuspecting readers with arguments about Syria and the CIA.